Another one from Facebook memories 
😍
Just spent 20 minutes of priceless FaceTime with my Parents (86 years old each). Mum was trying to demonstrate Dad’s new all singing, all dancing chair which reclines and stands him up. Most of her footage comprised the ceiling, the top of his head, his slippers and various angles of his pyjama crotch. These things can’t be bottled. Pure magic.
Just found this historical post on my personal Facebook memories!
Just a little worried that my neighbour may think I have been abducted. Normally, I put the eggs they buy from our hens in a predetermined place in case I am out, and if I am in we stop after they have collected them and have a chat about life, the universe and local village gossip. Today I was in. However, I felt the need to hide behind the shed when I heard their car draw up at the gates, leaving an empty, silent house with all the doors wide open, a cup of tea on the kitchen counter, dogs lounging on the grass and the car boot open. From my concealed position I heard the eggs duly being collected after a bit of aimless pacing around the house and “hello”-ing. I shall have to remember to resist making the most of the sunny weather whilst picking strawberries, gradually divesting myself of fleece and t-shirt and ending up in my bra and a pair of shorts with an assortment of plastic clothes pegs filched off the washing line holding my hair out of my eyes.
Has been playing the game of “beat the hen to the gooseberry”. Entertaining if a little prickly. As I removed the cage from my burgeoning gooseberry bush, all the hens, who until then had been strutting around it and beadily eyeing up the reddening fruit, rushed forward in a wave of feathers and squawking to get their grubby little beaks on the lovely ripe crop. Even my sulky, broody Lacy Wynadotte, who refuses to get out of bed for anything or anyone, came along to check out the fuss and suddenly discovered her turbo charge as she managed to flappingly levitate herself to come eye to eye with me over the top of the bush.
And what an excellent plan B.
I enjoyed a leisurely yomp up the Ben and mused about the times we have been up there as a family. The first time we climbed it was Christmas Day 2006, junior daughter was 5 and it was a brilliantly sunny winter’s day. We ascended in T-shirts, had a picnic at the top and opened a present each. We have tried to climb it every Christmas Day since then and have done so in all weathers. The second year, there was a 40 knot wind and junior daughter had to be physically restrained from soaring up and off like a kite as her all in one “muddy buddy” suit inflated with each gust. There was the year with thigh deep snow and snow cornices hanging off the peak, which prompted a complete sense of humour failure in one of our guests. There was the ascent in sheet ice, when the only form of safe descent was sliding down on our arses. (That reminds me of a summer descent of Blencathra with a friend who was unhappy about heights and slopes, who slid down the dry grass so rapidly on his bum that he managed to set fire to his leggings with the friction).
Mountain walks, family, friends, dogs, picnics and adventures all enriching my life and leaving me with happy memories.
Big brother, who loved nothing better than pulling on his old walking boots and striding off up a hill, was watching me and smiling today.
Beautifully sunny day. Home alone for the weekend. Have done my indoors work whilst it was a bit cloudy. Now sitting in the garden on a sun longer drinking iced tea and considering my afternoon activity. Initial plan, repaint and repair henhouse. Revised plan, slow and middle aged ascent of my favourite local mountain with three of the four dogs, leaving the old Labrador snoozing and the hen house dilapidating for another day or so, with a bottle of rosé and a salmon steak and salad in the fridge for my return.
When we moved to this house, senior daughter was 4. One day, whilst driving along near our village, she noticed a number of recently planted saplings on a hillside, which were really just sticks, and a very small, established, tree in the centre. “Oh, Mummy, Look! What a teeny weeny tree!”
Over the years we regularly picked out her “teeny weeny tree” on our journey and noticed its neighbouring saplings slowly catching up.
Time becomes busy and differing things catch the attention of growing teenagers (Instagram and Snapchat mainly) so we didn’t really notice the changes so much lately.
Now she is at University and yesterday, for the first time in a while, I glanced over to look and found her tree had been subsumed by its burgeoning neighbours and was no longer visible.
Life charges on without us noticing.
Don’t stop looking to find the teeny weeny trees before they get lost to you forever.
It’s an odd thing to say, but I do love a funeral. It’s comforting, necessary, cathartic, and beautiful. We said a collective and emotional goodbye to my brother on a glorious day in beautiful surroundings. At least 200 people turned up at the church for a service that couldn’t have been more perfect. His wonderful sons (who had only weeks before stood up and shared their memories of their grandfather – “Poppa”) spoke about what an incredible role model their father was and how kind, loving and supportive he had always been. “He was the perfect Beta male. The best father one could hope for” and the theme from all of them was “Thanks, Dad. We love you”.
Mum, who was ushered in by my brother, was looking as glamorous and befuddled as usual “Who’s funeral is this, again?” and took it all in her stride. It was right to tell her of her eldest son’s death in the end.
At the wake, in the beautiful village hall that he had a hand in fundraising for and designing, Mum happily and endlessly mineswept the buffet. We all sat in the sun outside on rugs and shot the breeze and remembered and laughed. Eventually, my sister in law sat down and, having had nothing to eat because she was talking to all the people who had come from far and wide, was presented with a plate of sandwiches and cakes. Mum, sitting next to her with a flower, filched from the display, behind her right ear cast a beady eye over this food and asked “Are you going to eat all that?” whilst simultaneously helping herself to half of it.
Adieu, big brother. You’ll never be forgotten.
Repeat prescriptions for me and my dog.
Enough said.
56 year old working mother of two’s morning routine:
Get out of bed at 0520 after a typically menopausal night of insomnia.
Unable to find dressing gown as teenager has nicked it and despite furtling in the dark cesspit of her room whilst she slumbers on, cannot locate it amongst the widely scattered detritus.
Put on husband’s (who is off doing an 800 mile six week walk) dressing gown.
Locate odd fusty smell following me around to said dressing gown and immediately divest myself of it and put it in washing machine – ew.
Make pot of tea.
Let dogs out of run, walk them round garden and poo pick lawn.
Pick up wriggling spaniel for a cuddle and get kicked in eye making me temporarily blind and nauseated
Unceremoniously drop spaniel.
Water greenhouse.
Refill bird baths and hen water bowl.
Wipe dogs’ feet and put them in lovely clean kitchen where they immediately shed vast quantities of hair and drop assorted pine cones, sticks and dried hen poo that they have picked up in their mouths from the garden.
Let hens out of shed.
Count hens.
Return to shed and hoof out broody hens prompting much huffy clucking and feather rustling.
Collect eggs.
Sneak a peek at blackbird nest in shed now containing four fat and fluffy chicks.
Go back into kitchen to drink tea.
Alerted to horrendous poultry neglect by outraged tapping on the French windows.
Take bag of porridge oats and scatter it on patio for the fat and overfed feathery gits.
Shout at teenager to get out of bed.
Shower, dress and breakfast.
0730 Go to work.
19 year old university student after end of first year and going to holiday job’s morning:
Roll out of bed at 0645.
Lock self in bathroom for 10 mins.
Eat instant porridge whilst standing up, instagramming and dressing.
Put dirty porridge bowl in sink.
0700 go to work.
Back home and still on compassionate leave from work until Monday. Should be on call this weekend and feel guilty as I am physically able to go to work, but swinging between feeling completely fine and being unable to perform the simplest tasks. Coping by extreme gardening, extended dog walks and imaginative hot drink concoctions now the sun has gone in and it’s grey and cloudy. Husband and children away and busy doing their own stuff so feel relieved, but sad, that I am on my own, which I think I need to be at the moment. My heart is heavy with loss.
Comfortably Mum 